Mike Stellar (14 page)

Whoooooooossssshhhhhh …

I jumped about eighty-five feet into the air. Through the huge window, I saw feet gliding to a stop right above the now open outer door of the air lock capsule.

There was someone outside, and he was coming in!

I should have run right then, but I couldn’t move. My breath was coming in short bursts and the room spun around me. I grabbed the table for support and watched as the feet floated into the air lock capsule.

Aliens!
my brain screamed.
The ship is being taken over.

Then there was another loud
whooooooosh
and the floating figure in the capsule landed with a thunk on the floor. He had closed the hatch and flipped on the AutoGrav.

I watched in horror as he—the alien—whoever—removed his helmet.

Huh? It was the captain. And as soon as I recognized him, he saw me staring. I thought about running, but it was definitely too late for that.

“Son?” he said as the thick, clear plastic air lock door opened. “Michael Stellar? Is that you?”

Feeling all blood, sensation, and muscle control drain from my face, I tried to smile. “Oh, hi, Captain,” I said in a strangled voice.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, his face clouding over. “This is a restricted area.”

“I’m, uh, just looking for my mom,” I answered, feeling proud that I remembered my cover story as I tried desperately to control my rising panic.

“She isn’t at home getting ready for work?” he asked skeptically. I could see that he was looking me over, checking out my hands and the pockets of my jumpsuit.

“Uh. Maybe she is, actually,” I said lamely. “I just, uh, didn’t see her at breakfast, and, uh, Dad was in the shower, so I couldn’t ask him, and so, uh, I thought I’d come looking for her.” I was such a bad liar. I could feel my face burning.

“You best get home now, son. Your mom isn’t due here for another hour. If she’s not at your apartment, and your dad doesn’t know where she is … well … come back and I’ll call up a rescue party.” He looked pretty stern still, but there was a small twinkle in his eye.

“Yes, sir,” I answered, practically running for the door.

“Oh, and, Mike?”

“Yes?”

“Let’s not mention this to anyone, okay? Some people frown on the captain of the ship flying around
outside
the ship.”

I nodded and hightailed it out the door.

Right on cue my peapod buzzed. Stinky was going to love this.

I scooted into
the men’s room, climbed onto the toilet in the last stall, and took my usual position sitting on the tank.

Stinky kept saying, “Mike? Are you there?”

“Right here,” I said quietly “I was out in the hall, sorry.”

“You sound … weird. Are you okay?”

“Man, Stinky, I just busted into the flight deck and—”

“You did
what?”

“I busted into the flight deck. It was the only way to find out where the ship is going without waiting a billion years to hack into the system.”

“Why couldn’t you just ask your mom?” Stinky asked.

“Duh, knucklebutt, all ship movement is classified.”

“Hey, don’t call me knucklebutt, snotmunch.”

“Sorry. It’s been a very stressful morning.”

“So what’d you find out?”

“The ship is definitely moving, and it’s definitely still moving in the direction of the Fold. We’re supposed to be there in three days.”

“Whoa, that’s fast!”

“I know. It doesn’t make sense. Without time to power the plasma propulsion—”

“You’ll never get—”

“To the other side of the Fold. I know.”

We were both silent for a minute. And then Stinky started talking about not finding much in Mrs. H’s old hard drives.

He laughed ruefully. “I don’t know why I ever listen to you. ‘You can get a detention so you can snoop in Mrs. H’s things and blahdy blah blah,’” he said, imitating me in this annoying high-pitched voice. “Who knew throwing a flashnobang onstage during an assembly would cause
so
much trouble?”

I couldn’t help laughing. “Oh, come on. I never told you to go crazy and momentarily blind the entire student population! I just meant toss one in homeroom and get an
afternoon
of detention or something. Not days and days and days.”

“You suck.” Stinky pouted for a moment. “Did you find anything else out while you were lurking
around the ship? Mrs. H’s true identity as a child-eating zombie?”

“Actually,” I said, “I was in her apartment for a little bit last week.”

I could tell that Stinky was stunned. “You broke into her apartment? Dude, I am
impressed!”

“I didn’t break in,” I said, feeling my chest puff out with pride anyway. “But I did find something cool.”

“What?”

“An old poem or something, written on actual paper. It fell out of a framed thing I accidentally broke.”

“What’s cool about that?”

“Don’t know. But it was weird. Why would there be a poem hidden behind some dumb certificate in a frame?”

“Did you get caught?”

“I’m hurt, Stinky. Why would you automatically think I would get caught?”

“Because I know you, Mike. You think you’re a good snoop, but you’re not. So did you?”

“Yes,” I said quietly.

Stinky let out a howl. “I guess you’ve been in detention for a week, too?”

“No,” I said. “That’s the really weird part. When she opened the door and saw me standing there, I just bolted. And she hasn’t said anything to me about it. Larc must have said something to her.”

“Larc?”

“Yeah. She was with me.”

“You were in Mrs. H’s apartment … alone with a girl? Dude, I am even
more
impressed!”

I felt myself blush. “It was nothing like that. We were running away from someone and she had a key to Mrs. H’s apartment.”

“Who were you running away from?” Stinky asked excitedly. “Man, you move to outer space for a week and suddenly you’ve turned into Space Agent Stellar!”

My blush deepened. “It’s a long story, and I kinda have to go now, Stink. I really, really,
really
need to get home before my parents wake up.”

“Okay—but you owe me a story.”

“Hey, Stink?”

“Yeah?”

“Once I’m out near the Fold, these peapods are just going to be shiny little balls of metal.”

“I know, man.” Stinky paused. “Hey Have you heard anything about Neeters?”

“I’m working on a hack for her com-bracelet, so hopefully in the next day or so I’ll try to contact her.”

“Well, give me a buzz if you find anything out, okay? If I don’t hear from you, I’ll just figure your sad little brain couldn’t handle the onslaught of work it’s having to do these days.”

“Ha-ha, frog lips.” Now it was my turn to pause. “If
we do go out of range before you and I talk again, Stink, well, thanks for being there to help me out with all of this crazy stuff. You really are a great friend.” I hadn’t expected to say the long good-bye to Stinky this morning and I felt a little awkward.

“Yeah, yeah, fartblossom, you’re a good friend, too.”

We both laughed.

“See you, man,” I said.

“See you.”

I put the peapod back in my pocket and headed out of the restroom toward the apartment. I needed to hustle.

I snuck through
the front door and hurried to my room, trying not to alert any of Mr. Shugabert’s motion-activated messages.

Once in my room, I pushed the square button on the far wall, and my desk and computer slid up from the floor. A bench popped out under the desk and I sat down and powered up my computer. I synced up my handheld to the computer so I could get a readout of the progress on my com-bracelet hack.

Looking down at my handheld, I caught a flash of light out of the corner of my eye. I glanced up and saw a small IM pictoscreen in the corner of my monitor. Weird. The image was fuzzy and black and white, which was even stranger. Squinting, I leaned closer to the monitor to see what was going on.

I gasped.

It was Nita! My hack had worked!

“Mike?” Nita’s voice was barely audible over the static. “Is that you?”

“Nita?” I said into the built-in microphone on my computer.

“I don’t … lot of time, Mi …” She was breaking up badly. But I could tell there was something in her voice. Something I didn’t recognize. She was … scared.

“Your com-bracelet,” I blurted. “The hack … it worked…. I should go get Mom and Dad.” I stood up quickly, tripping on the bench.

“No.” She propelled her face closer to the bracelet. “Not get … and Dad. Just shut up and li … to me.”

Ah. There was the Nita I recognized. Here I was the one who found
her
and she was giving the orders.

She continued at a fast clip with only a few words clear enough for me to hear. “I need … tell you some important … Mike. And I don’t want … ask any … or do anything stupid.”

“Nita. Wait. I can’t understand you. Let me mess with the signal for a minute…. Can you just keep talking so I can—”

“I just said … Mike. Just shut … and lis—”

“Where are you?” I interrupted. “Are you okay? Are you with the EFEs?”

She nodded. “Long story …”

“So
you
did this,” I said, surprised at the anger welling up in me. “You ran off on purpose?”

She shook her head. “Not now … No time. I’ve uncovered … information, Mike … last Mars mission …”

She was barely coming through at all now and I impulsively smacked my computer monitor to try to miraculously fix the poor reception.

“… passenger manifest … last trip … Hazel-wood …”

There was a pause, and I thought the connection had been broken. I jumped up and nearly turned the computer off so that I could try to manually boost the signal. But her image appeared again. I stared at the salt-and-pepper static of her face and scrunched up my own. Her mouth was moving again, but I couldn’t hear anything. I kept motioning with my arms and cupping my hands to my ears to indicate to her that I couldn’t hear her. Then I felt like a moron. Just because I couldn’t hear her, it didn’t mean she couldn’t hear me.

I leaned in close to the microphone and said, “I can’t hear anything you’re sa—”

Suddenly her voice crackled back to life. She sounded impatient. “Da … Hazelwood …
president…
Project!”

“David
Hazelwood?” I asked. Was Nita saying that David Hazelwood had been on the first mission? She couldn’t be. That wouldn’t make any sense at all. The
company would never have risked sending their then president out on a dangerous mission. Besides, after two years the public would have heard about his disappearance. Mom said he had “retired early.”

Nita’s mouth was again moving with no sound. Finally her voice rang out:
“Sabotaged
the ship!”

It took a second for what she had said to sink in and then I was flabbergasted.

“What? Who sabotaged the ship? David Hazel-wood? Which ship?” I felt my stomach turn ice-cold. “Nita? What are you talking about?”

“… ora. Mike … she knows. No-bid contracts … destruction … all planets … terraform. Destroy.”

She wasn’t making any sense at all now. I grabbed my handheld and started writing down the words she was saying. Maybe I could puzzle them together.

Nita was still talking, faster now and in a lower voice. “Haze … company charter. Aurora … money-crazed.
Spirit …
lost … Fold. Hub … will know. Must find … Suspicious … Mom and Da—”

I was scribbling like crazy, trying to take down every sound she was making.

“… isn’t safe. EFEs … they say … Hubble … alive.”

“Nita!” I nearly shouted. “Slow down. I can’t understand y—” But she was barreling on.

“Can’t tell … Mom and Dad…. Think … danger.
You, too.
Sojourner
is going to be … just like …
Spirit
was … Aurora. Cover-up. Not a secret.”

My mind was spinning. This was amazing! Someone other than me or Stinky had finally mentioned something about a cover-up.

“Nita …,” I pleaded, “I can’t understand what you’re saying. What do you mean ‘cover-up’? Can you say that last part over again?”